The rapid growth of biotechnology has led to the need for large scale tissue culture techniques for anchorage dependent cells. Roller bottles are used extensively in the industry for this purpose. Cells are cultured whilst attached to the interior of the roller bottle. Existing roller bottle machines provide for rotation of the bottles to keep the cells bathed in culture medium during culture stages. The processing operations such as innoculation, culture medium supply, or harvesting for example which require the flow of fluids into or out of the roller bottle are carried out manually or by expensive mechanical handling systems such as robots.
For large scale production, this process can be awkward, time consuming, and carries the risk of infection of the bottle contents by foreign organisms during handling.
In some systems, the need to physically handle the roller bottles is eliminated by providing each bottle with a special cap that is equipped with a rotary seal and feed tubes that allows the bottle to rotate and yet facilitates the injection or extraction of process fluids. This system is prone to external infection via the rotary seals however, and is in any case mechanically complex and thus expensive.
A system that would provide aseptic access to the interior of a large number of roller bottles via a single connection whilst still allowing the bottles to rotate, but which did not require the use of a large number of rotating seals, would be of greater practical and economic advantage to large scale roller bottle processes using anchorage dependent cells.